


My Girl

by PagetPaulson



Category: Criminal Minds, Rizzoli & Isles
Genre: F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-08-18
Updated: 2015-09-16
Packaged: 2018-02-13 17:25:17
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 14
Words: 12,080
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2158965
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/PagetPaulson/pseuds/PagetPaulson
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"But I love you," she breathed, those haunted words hiccupped through her lips as she tried to find her breath.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

Jane practically growled at the guy that Korsak was pulling her away from and Frost and Frankie had thrown against the wall. What idiot asks a girl for a dance and then shoves his tongue down her throat when all she did was ask what his favorite band was?

Dumbass.

"Come on," she sighed as Korsak pushed her down into her seat. "You could have let me deck the guy. I can protect myself."

"And we can help."

Jane eyed the older man, noticing her friends sitting back down once the bouncers had thrown him out of the bar. "It's not like he was dangerous, he was just an asshole."

"Just say thank you and move on," the blond at the table smiled, sipping at the beer that she had been bought. "Men find the need to demonstrate their physical prowess when the idea comes into play, and although the protectant character lies with the women in most cases for maternal reasons, men find the need to show it off more often."

The Boston cop stared wide eyed at her friend as the rest of their group sat back down. "I'm sorry, are we back in the office?"

Maura looked as if she were thinking for a minute before she shook her head. "No."

"Then leave the damn science at home," she laughed, clinking her beer with Frost's.

"Well it's not technically physical science to be computed in a lab as it's a-"

"No," Frost interrupted. "No more."

Jane hid her smirk behind the tip of her beer bottle, watching as the medical examiner began talking with the man at her side.

Their Friday night bar nights were something that Jane had always looked forward to; a time to sit back and finally relax and think of things other than murders littering their Boston streets. It was the first Friday in five weeks that they had been able to get off work and rest without a case hanging over their heads, and the group intended on using it wisely.

Jane's eyes widened when she saw another round of beers coming toward their table. "Ready to chug?"

Maura frowned, looking displeasingly toward the tray. "Well," she sighed, her hand circling around the slightly older woman's wrist to stop her from grabbing another cold bottle. "Let's not get hasty. Who do you think will be driving you home?"

"If you don't want me to drive then you drive," she shrugged, yanking her arm away from the blond.

"Oh no," the medical examiner laughed gently, "I can't drive you either. I've had a drink."

Jane frowned. "You've had two sips."

Maura's eyes flickered down to her beer before looking back to her friend. "So? That does not mean that the alcohol hasn't gotten into my bloodstream, Jane. It does not matter how much I've drunken in the timespan, I'd still be under the influence."

"Fine," she huffed. "I'll take a cab."

"And just leave your car here until you force someone to drive you back here so you can get it? You'd waste somebody's time like that?"

Jane looked wide eyed at the medical examiner before turning to look at her friend's, a grin popping onto her face as they started laughing. "Can someone help me out here, please?"

Looking up from the bowl of peanuts that sat in the center of their table, Frankie's eyes darkened. "I'll be back in a minute, guys. Bathroom." Once he saw the others at the table nod, the newly found officer got himself up from the stool and rushed over to the bar's entrance door. "What the hell are you doing here?"

"I'm sorry but I need to see Jane."

"Do you know how much pain you caused her last time?" he asked incredulously, his brow furrowing. "You need to leave."

The brunette woman glared at the younger man. "I am not leaving until I get to talk to her." Rounding the officer, the mysterious woman raised her hand in the air. "Jane?"

Hearing her name being called from behind, Jane's eyes rolled. "Oh my God, please don't tell me that's my mother. I don't need her breathing down my neck on my one food night."

Frost's neck strained. "Not technically."

"Well who the hell is it?"

"It's your ex-wife," Korsak stated gently, watching as the brunette's eyes lit up.

Jane's head spun, seeing the brunette woman looking at her from across the bar with those beautiful brown eyes. "Emily?"

The FBI agent readily nodded her head, fighting off Frankie's hands and running across the floor. "Jane you need to come with me," she breathed. "It's Sammy."

"Where is she? Why isn't she with you?"

Maura looked up to her friend. "Who's Sammy?"

Jane shook her head. "What is it?"

"She's back in D.C," the brunette breathed, tears stinging her eyes. "She's in the hospital. You need to come back with me."

Pulling her coat from the back of her chair, Jane followed the older woman out of the bar, passing by her brother with a pleading glance. "Tell ma' to call me."

"We're coming with you!"

Emily stopped short, looking back to the group of people that came running up after them. "I will buy you all tickets on the next flight, but Jane and I need to leave now."

Frost looked darkly at the beautiful woman. "If she goes then we're going."

"Sammy is _our_ daughter," she growled. "You want to come, you wait until we've landed and we know her prognosis. Do you hear me?"

Jane nodded. "Please guys, I have to go."


	2. Chapter 2

Jane tapped her fingers against the window of the taxi, her head lolling to the side as her frustration and stress began to tire her. "You could have just called, you know," she sighed, running her hand over her reddened eyes as even her alert body grew tired from the plane ride. "Coming to Boston and getting me is nice, but it's a waste of time when you could have been with Sammy."

The older brunette wiped the tears from her cheeks at the thought of her daughter. "My mother is there. Sammy was playing with Jack at the team's barbecue and she just all of a sudden fell down. We got her to the hospital and they said they were running test, but it had been three hours of me just sitting there because they weren't giving me any details of what was happening."

Reaching into her pocket, Jane took out a tissue and handed it to the woman she once called her wife. "Calm down."

"I'm not that great at compartmentalizing anymore," she laughed humorlessly, throwing her tossled hair up into a ponytail to help it stop from sticking at her sweating neck. "Sammy continuously getting hurt, bad cases, losing Bambi," she sighed, "it's just been too much."

The Italian detective felt her own eyes tear at the name that they hadn't said in close to three years. "How have you been holding up? Last time we spoke, you told me you were back in therapy."

Emily's lips rolled in and stuck between her teeth. "How would you be doing?"

"I don't know, I don't have custody of our daughter."

The brown eyed agent looked incredulously to her ex. "You have visitation."

"You live like ten states away!" Jane stressed. "When am I supposed to go to you or you come to me when our schedules are as busy as the fucking President's?"

Emily frowned. "There are a couple of exaggerations in that sentence."

Their eyes immediately connected as the taxi stopped, anger in one set while sadness dwelled in the other. Problems hadn't been resolved after their split, but as the door opened, they made a note to keep it civil for their daughter.

Jane followed the older brunette through the halls of the hospital and up into the children's ward, their hands stiffly clasped together as they tried to stay positive for their eight year old. "Where's the front desk?"

Emily let out a breath, nodding toward the hall they were coming up to. "That's her doctor. Dr. Grant!" She pulled her ex along, their fingers intertwining just as they always had. "This is Samantha's other mother, Jane Rizzoli."

"From Boston, correct?" The blond woman smiled gently to the member of the growing family that had come to support Samantha Prentiss-Rizzoli. "Well your daughter is finally out of testing and she's fast asleep in her room. Let me show you there," she nodded.

Jane gulped as they walked slowly toward an open door, her hand tightening around Emily's when she saw the Ambassador and entire BAU team seated just outside. "Is she alright?"

Dr. Grant kept her head from nodding at the question. "We're keeping her here for about a week, because that's when we'd get our results from her tests. It's not recommended to let her leave before we can diagnose her."

The ambassador's daughter led the younger brunette into the hospital room, both gasping at the sight of their little girl lying peacefully in the bed, tubes coming from her nose and an IV stuck in her arm.

"There's also a pulse monitor on her finger so please be careful to not touch it."

Both parents found themselves sitting beside one another at the side of Samantha's bed, oblivious to the group standing just outside the door and watching as they fell apart in each other's arms.


	3. Chapter 3

JJ sat back in her chair, her head resting against the hallway's cleanest wall as her hands latched onto her husband's. Her eyes quickly flickered up to see Hotch's staring back at her, his hand resting on Haley's thigh. It had been three hours of them just sitting there, hearing the couple inside the hospital room continuing to cry beside their daughter's bed. "Poor girl."

"What even happened?"

The blond glanced over to Morgan and shrugged. "She just fell down. I thought that Jack and Henry might have been rough with her but they both promised that wasn't it."

Hotch nodded. "Jack came to me crying because he thought he somehow hurt her."

"Sammy's a strong little girl," the Italian in the group gruffed, scratching gently at his beard, "just like both her mothers. She'll be ok."

"Our baby Sammy," the technical analyst smiled.

Fidgeting slightly in his seat, Reid finally looked up from his lap. "Why did they break up? Em doesn't like to talk about Jane much unless Sammy brings her up."

JJ looked to her friend with sad eyes. "Sometimes, no matter how much you love someone, you can't make it work. Scheduling, loving both their jobs too much to give them up," she shrugged.

"Losing Bambi," the Unit Chief chimed in, a sad note springing into his tone. "The world was pretty much against them to begin with."

Hearing the sounds of a stampede headed toward them from the other end of the hallway, the heads of the BAU spun to see a small group running from the elevators.

"Agent Hotchner?" Korsask asked, waiting for the younger man to stand before he took his hand. "Emily told us that you'd be here waiting for us."

"Are you Jane's Boston team?"

Frankie came up from behind the others in his circle and stuck his hand out. "Jane's brother, Frankie. We've met before." They had all been at the wedding, but pleasantries had never been given since they'd been on other sides of the room, and the members of the BAU had been trying to get Emily's mother away from the finally married pair so she wouldn't ruin their night. "How's Sammy?"

JJ squeezed her husband's hand that much tighter. "No one knows yet. They think it'll take at least a week for the test results to come back."

"So why is everyone just sitting here?"

Dave glared up to the head detective that stood in the center of the hallway. "For support," he ground out.

Emily blinked, lifting her head from the younger brunette's shoulder that she had been crying on when she heard muffled voices coming from the hallway. "I think your team is here," she rasped, her voice sounding just as her ex's did from crying too much.

"Good," the detective nodded, quickly feeling a loss as Emily moved to sit back in her seat.

She let her dark eyes look toward the woman she had fallen in love with the moment she saw her dancing in that Boston bar, and her heart immediately began to flutter. "They care about you," she tried to smile. "Your friends nearly took my head off back in Boston."

Jane kept her eyes on her daughter, making sure she saw her chest moving up and down with every breath she took in. "Yeah well, they're protective." A small chuckle left her throat at the thought of her ex-wife's Unit Chief. "What about Hotch out there? The man never can look at me without glaring."

"He does that too his wife too," she scoffed. "Don't feel special."

They laughed, and the feeling of them drifting back into what they had before they had gotten their divorce.

Emily's lips tried their best to stop smiling at the sound of the younger woman's laughter, and she gently shook her head. "I was actually going to call you when the weekend came around," she nodded. The gentle black tendrils of her hair that had fallen from her ponytail shading her features when she bent her head, afraid of seeing Jane's beautiful brown eyes looking at her. "I spoke with Sammy about it, and we wanted to take a vacation up in Boston. She misses you and her nana, and because I have a month's leave starting Monday, it seemed logical."

Jane's jaw dropped. "You have a month's leave?"

"Well it was two weeks, but the Director is my godfather so when he heard that I was thinking of taking Sammy up to Massachusetts, he lengthened it," she smiled.

The Italian woman pursed her lips as she leaned back in her chair, her eyes going back to her daughter. "Lucky you."

Emily's features dimmed, those chocolate eyes looking the detective up and down. "Does that sound ok? Us coming up to visit?"

"I'd love that," she said sincerely, smiling tightly to her ex.

"And maybe you'd be able to take her for a week or two?" Emily nodded when she saw Jane looked wide eyed at her. "Summer vacation is coming up and I know she misses you." _I miss you too_.

Jane let out a breath, her hands clasping the arms of the plastic chair she sat in as she smiled. "I'd really love that, Emily. Thank you."

Looking back to her daughter that lie still in the sanitary bed, Jane let her thumbnail find its way between her teeth; a nervous little habit that she had picked up from her ex. "She'll be ok."

Emily smiled at the sight of her little girl, imaging how excited she would be if she knew her momma was in the room with her. "She'll definitely be ok." She was a Prentiss-Rizzoli after all, two halves of the strongest families out there. She would be fine.


	4. Chapter 4

Looking up from the message from her mother on her cell phone that had apologized for having to leave them earlier than she thought, Emily saw her ex trudge back into the room. "Hey," she said distractedly, her fingers going to work on reply to her daughter's grandmother. "How'd everything go with your team?"

Jane almost growled as she sat herself back down, slouching back into the plastic as if she were on her couch at home. "Every damn hotel in this city is booked. Why do you live here? It sucks."

The brunette fought a smile as she continued her text message.

Letting out a sigh, Jane glanced over to the older woman and saw her completely focused on the phone in her hand. "Who are you texting? Girlfriend?"

Emily grinned as she pressed the send button. She turned in her seat and showed the screen to her ex-wife. "Mother," she smirked, watching as Jane's face contorted into an even deeper frown. "Surprised?"

"Not really," the Italian breathed, looking to the little girl lying in the hospital bed.

"Well do your friends have rooms for the night?"

Jane slowly nodded her head. "Yup. They got rooms at the Omni Shoreham Hotel in the city, and when I called to see if there were any others available, the concierge laughed at me."

Emily's brow furrowed. "How did they get rooms if there aren't any left? When did they call?"

"Before they all got on the plane to come here."

Nodding her head to the statement, Emily's teeth dug into the flesh of her bottom lip. "There's always my house."

Jane's eyes widened, her head shaking as she tried to sit up straighter in her chair. "Emily, I can't do that. I'm not ready to do that."

"Do what?" The agent's dark eyes looked questioningly toward the younger woman. "I have two guest rooms, and one is even on the floor below my bedroom. It's not as if I'm asking you to come into my bed." When Jane continued to shake her head, Emily sighed. "Fine," she shrugged, sitting back in her seat. "Why don't you just stay in one of your teammates' room?"

"Because," she spit out, "Maura had a weird bedtime ritual that, last time, actually made me sick, and Frankie doesn't want to share with me because I snore and talk in my sleep."

Emily's upper lip twitched in amusement at the look on her ex-wife's face. "You can't do both."

"Well I obviously have to," the detective laughed. "Do you remember? Which is it?"

Staring deeply into those brown eyes that had teared up when they stood up in front of their families to unite their love, Emily smiled. "You do snore, very lightly," she whispered. "I remember."

Jane's breath caught at that familiar sparkle she saw in her ex's eyes, and she graciously nodded her head. "But it's not disruptive."

"Not at all," she laughed lightly. "Which is exactly the reason why I wouldn't mind having you stay at my house while you're here. It's really not a big deal, and you need a place to stay."

She had heard the complaining all the way to the house.

After telling each and every one of their team members, once they had forced them to leave the young Prentiss-Rizzoli girl's beside, the couple had gotten into Emily's SUV that her friends had driven there for her. Not two minutes away from the hospital and Jane had begun to bitch, trying to get out of staying with Emily so she wouldn't have to bear the brunt of the emotions that she knew would begin to flood her mind.

But she had zoned her out. Turning up the radio, Emily began singing to her favorite songs that came from the speakers. She couldn't keep her mind from going back to her sad little girl lying in that hospital room, but she needed to help take the edge off for both of them.

Leading them into her house and locking the door behind them, Emily took Jane's jacket. "The living room's right through there."

The Italian detective took in a breath as she slowly made her way through the hallway, her brain going from one memory to another as she saw the furniture they had shared in their old home. "Thank you for this," she nodded, sitting down on the couch. "You didn't have to."

"Well if I left you to freeze out in an alleyway, I'm not sure Sammy would forgive me."

Jane watched as the older woman smiled, and her mouth watered at the sight of those sparkling teeth that had gotten her in the first place. "Well then I'll just thank Sammy when she wakes up."

Emily's lips tightened at the thought of her baby back in the hospital, and she slowly shook her head. "Well today's been a long day. Why don't I show you to your room and we'll meet back up in the morning." Standing, she winked down to the detective. "The kitchen, eight sharp."

Taking her time to stand up, trying to gather up her courage in the second and a half she had, the brunette woman nodded her head. "The kitchen." She let the other mother lead her toward the room where she'd be sleeping, and feeling Emily's warm hand lie against the small of her back, Jane's heart clenched.


	5. Chapter 5

_Those dark brown eyes that had stared her down from across the room bore into hers, the hands that were connected to those smoldering eyes through the rest of the beautiful woman's slender body pushing her back against the bathroom wall. "So," the voice husked, "three fingers or four?"_

Blinking roughly to finally wake herself up, Jane groaned and rolled onto her stomach. She glared at the alarm clock that she was damn well sure of wasn't there the night before, and her hand smacked down against the button to shut the blaring noise off.

"Emily," she growled, throwing the covers off of herself and jumping out of the guest bed, storming out of the room. The older woman had come in, while she was sleeping, and put a damn alarm there to wake her up. Ridiculous.

"Emily!"

The brunette turned her eyes from the paper in her hands to see her ex stomping her way into the kitchen. "Did you sleep well?"

"What the fuck is with that alarm?" she complained.

"Wel-"

"Oh no!" Jane held up her hands as she made her way closer to the older woman who sat at the island. "Don't respond now. It'll take a few hours for my ears to stop bleeding."

Emily's lips curled into a tight smirk at the complaints coming from the younger brunette, and she watched as she came up beside the granite island. "I apologize, but I didn't know how else I would get you to wake up."

The detective's eyes hardened on her ex-wife. "You've woken me up before."

"Right," she scoffed. "That wasn't gonna happen this time."

Frowning, the husky brunette tilted her head to the side. "Wait, why not?"

"Unless I was kissing you or promised you some type of sexual favor, nothing could wake you up."

Jane, whose face now fell at the recollection, shifted from foot to foot. "Oh yeah."

Finally realizing the ensemble that the Italian woman was wearing, Emily's brow scrunched. "You slept in your suit?" She had made sure that the night before Jane had something to wear to bed.

Looking down to her clothing, Jane shrugged. "Yeah."

"There were clothes in the drawer for you."

The brunette detective's brows raised at the sigh that left her ex. "Well excuse me, but how was I supposed to know?"

Emily scoffed. "Maybe because of the fact that I purposefully opened them up while you were in the bathroom so you'd see them!" she said, baffled that Jane would let the business suit wrinkle like it did.

"I closed the drawers! I didn't know they were there for me, I thought they were yours."

Emily gave a small shake of the head. "Those were your sweats and t-shirts in there," she said quietly, almost embarrassed about what she had done. "You had left some at home when we split, and it felt wrong to throw them away."

The detective's brown eyes stared at the slouching figure of her ex, and she noticed that the shorts that were hidden beneath the flowing robe Emily was wearing were also a pair of hers. Keeping her features as passive as possible, Jane nodded. "Well thank you," she smiled. "So are we going to get to the hospital?"

"Yeah," the older woman sighed, finally standing up from her seat and giving Jane a glimpse of her perked nipples that sat just beneath the material of her tank top. "What do you want for breakfast?"

"Coffee."

Emily rolled her eyes, opening up the fridge. "You need food, Jane."

The younger woman smirked as she stole the brunette's seat. "Do not."

Hearing that smile in the beautiful brunette woman's voice, Emily smiled as she looked at the food on the fridge shelves. "Please? For me?" She bit her lip at the sound of her own voice, knowing that she had used it in the same way to get other things from her ex when they had been married.

Jane let out a breath at tone, her tongue touching gently to the corner of her mouth just like the mother of her child always did. "Something small then," she nodded, her voice soft as Emily turned back around to face her so she could see those dark eyes that she had fallen in love with. "We don't want to stay here too long, right? Sammy's waiting."

"Of course," Emily smiled.

Only seventeen minutes later, the two were out of the house, Jane getting to drive the car since she was the one who had grabbed the keys off of the counter and ran to the car before Emily even got the chance.

Practically throwing herself back against the leather seat, Emily glared at the younger woman who sped toward the exit. "If you crash this car, I swear to God I'll have your head."

"I just want to get to Sammy."

"She's still going to be there if you slow down to the damn speed limit," the ambassador's daughter growled. "You're gonna be so sorry when we don't even get to the hospital because we've gotten in an accident."

Jane rolled her eyes at the annoyance she heard in the other mother's voice. "We will be just fine. It's not the first time I've driven a car, Em."

Emily's hand shot up to grab the handle above her head, her body slamming against the console when they shot around a turn. "Yeah well it sure doesn't seem that way," she huffed, knowing Jane was smiling as she continued to pay attention to the road. "Right there! The entrance is right there!"

Spinning the wheel, the Italian woman turned into the front parking lot of the hospital and parked, her head turning to smile at her ex-wife as she pulled the keys out of the ignition. "Ta da."

"Unbelievable," the brunette groaned, sprinting out of the car and toward the front doors excited to see her little girl. But once the duo was up to the children's floor, Emily slumped against the nurse's desk. "What are you talking about?"

The ebony man behind the counter kept his eyes in his file. "Visiting hours start at nine o'clock."

Glancing up to the clock, Emily's eyes read the big and little hands. Eight forty-two.

"Oh come on," Jane complained, looking darkly to the male nurse that finally looked up from the patient's file he had been reading. "You can't let us in eighteen minutes early? Our daughter had testing all fucking day yesterday and you're not letting us in?"

The nurse frowned. "You're both mothers to Samantha Prentiss-Rizzoli?"

"Yes, and?"

"Two women," he laughed. "Really?"

Emily's eyes hardened on the young man who was just out of college. "Yeah well I'm not a cock kind of girl," she said strongly, watching as the nurse's pupil's grew smaller. "Now let us the fuck in to see our daughter!"

"Ms. Prentiss?"

The brunette spun around, letting out a breath at the sight of one of her daughter's doctors. "Dr. Matthews, hello. Can you please tell him that we're allowed in?"

Putting a hand to the younger woman's elbow, he led both women over to a quieter section of the hallway. "I actually have something to discuss with you both. Dr. Grant will be here a little later, she had a surgery to do down on the second floor." Dr. Matthews looked to both brunettes with the softest of eyes. "We have Sammy's MRI results."

Jane reached down and found Emily's hand with hers, gripping the soft skin in the palm of her hand. "What is it?" He wouldn't be hesitating to tell them the results if they had come back clear, and she knew that.

"I'm so sorry, but we found an abnormal growth of tissue sitting in the left hemisphere of Samantha's brain."

Emily's jaw dropped. "Abnormal tissue growth? You mean?"

Dr. Matthews tightened his hold on the clipboard in his hand, watching as the taller woman before him automatically took Emily into her arms. "A brain tumor."


	6. Chapter 6

"My name is Angela Rizzoli," the Italian woman said very stoically, looking up to the nurses behind the front desk. "I'm here looking for my granddaughter's room, her name is Samantha. Both her mothers are here too, Emily and Jane Rizzoli."

The redhead behind the counter smiled up to the pensive looking grandmother once she closed the folder in front of her. "Samantha Prentiss-Rizzoli?"

"Yes."

"There's a huge group for the young girl right down the hall," she gestured, pointing down the hall. "Room 504, ma'am."

Angela gently nodded her head, giving a thank you before turning to make her way down the hall. Holding tightly onto the strap of her purse, the Boston grown woman tried to decipher the faces of the chatting group just outside what she thought to be Sammy's hospital door. Frankie had called her the night before to tell her that everyone had flown to D.C when they heard something was wrong with the little girl that had stolen all their hearts, but Stanley wouldn't let her leave until she had finished cleaning the kitchen like she said she would.

"Hey mom," Frankie sighed, his arms wrapping around his mother after she had ended up beside their small group.

"Where is she?" The mother of three let Maura give her a small hug before looking to the rest of the faces around her. "Where's Sammy?"

The blond from the BAU got up from her chair, holding her hand out to the older woman. "Hi Ms. Rizzoli, I'm JJ."

Angela tried to smile. "Yes, I remember all of you from the wedding."

"Both Emily and Jane are in the room right now, they've asked for some time alone." JJ cleared her throat, trying to stop the stinging in her eyes so she wouldn't cry. "They got Sammy's diagnosis back already."

Hugging the older woman closer to her, Jane pressed a kiss to her dark hair. "This isn't fair."

Emily's sigh came out shaking, her tears falling freely down her pale cheeks as she heard the beeps of the heart monitor round about the room.

"Mommy?"

Her hair flew as she head spun around at the sound, a sob ripping from her throat as the eight year old's eyes slowly peeled open. "Hey baby," she grinned, moving along with the younger woman in the room toward the bed. "Look who came down to see her little girl."

Samantha's brown eyes fluttered open, her hand gripping the mattress beneath her when she saw her mothers smiling down to her. "Momma?" She let out a dramatic gasp at the sight of her other mother and tried to smile. "Hi momma!"

"Hey little bug," the detective smiled, letting her hand rub along her small arm. "How are you feeling?"

"I missed you!" the eight year old screamed as she pulled the Italian down for a hug.

Jane laughed into her daughter's hair. "I'm gonna say that you're ok," she grinned. "You gave us a small scare there, babe."

Emily's fingers came up to wipe away the tears that had streamed down her face for the three hours they had been there that morning. "Do you feel better, honey?"

"Yeah mommy," she nodded slowly, those brown eyes squinting as a shot of pain flickered through her head. "My head hurts."

Containing the small whimper that wanted to escape her throat when she heard the door open up, the brunette agent turned her head to see Dr. Grant walking inside. "Hello doctor."

"Ms. Prentiss," Dr. Grant nodded, closing the door behind her to block out all the noise the group outside was making. "And Ms. Rizzoli, hello. And looks who's up," she smiled, seeing the young girl moving around in her bed. "Hi there Sammy."

"Hi."

"My name is Dr. Grant," the blond smiled, her finger coming up to point to her nametag. "I'm one of the doctors who is trying to understand what's going on, ok?"

Samantha put a hand to her head when she felt it begin to throb. "Am I hurt?"

Emily ran her fingers through her daughter's blond locks. "A little bit, baby," she whispered.

Sitting down on the unoccupied side of the bed, the doctor looked gently to the eight year old. "Sweetheart, we found some tissue in your brain that's not supposed to be there. That's what made you fall down at the park."

"Can you get it out?"

Dr. Grant smiled. "That's exactly what we're gonna do, but we need to wait at least until next week so all of our tests are back. Until then, you're going to have to stay here."

Samantha bit her lip, looking to the unfamiliar face beside her bed. "Can my mom's stay?"

"Trust me honey, I don't think they're going to want to leave."

Two hours later, the people out in the hall having come in to see Sammy, Angela giving all three in the room the biggest bear hugs she could give, Jane stared hard at her daughter's sleeping body. "I can't believe this."

Emily's eyes stared sadly down to her clasped hands. "I know," she snuffled. "It's not fair."

"I don't think anyone's life has been this shitty," she cursed. "Yours, mine, Sammy's. I mean, who the fuck is the one who gets to choose who goes through all of this and who gets to live the perfect life?" She definitely wanted to have a talk with whatever spiritual voodoo person above who was messing around with them.

"Please," Emily tried to quiet her, "just don't curse with her here."

Jane glared to the woman at her side. "Well what do you want me to do? Stay quiet? I am not losing another child, Emily."

The older brunette's eyes widened, and she fell forward as shock hit her. "Do you think I want this to happen? She's my daughter too, Jane. We adopted her together."

"And what about Bambi, huh? What about her?" Jane's eyes watered at the thought of their other daughter. "You tell me why we lost her."

Emily's teeth grit as she felt the other mother's resentment coming back, and anger seeped through her at the look in Jane's eyes. "How many times have we gone through this? I miss Bambi just as much as you do, but you cannot keep blaming it on me. Her dying was not my fault!"

The detective gave a dry laugh at the words, standing from her seat and glaring hard at the brunette. "Yeah? Well why don't you go tell that to her burial site your mother so graciously paid for?"

Wincing at the slamming of the hospital door, the ambassador's daughter's hands came up to cover her quivering lips.


	7. Chapter 7

"Angela? Is that you?"

Looking up from the stuffed animal that she had bought for her granddaughter, the Italian woman grinned. "Elizabeth, how have you been?"

The Ambassador took the other woman into a gentle hug, smiling the best she could. "I guess it's a whole reunion now, isn't it?" she nodded, looking to the giant cuddle toy in the younger woman's hands. "That sure is a big bear for Sammy," she chuckled.

Angela grinned. "Well I was going to bring one from Boston but they wouldn't let me take it on the plane. But this one is even bigger than the other, and I just really hope she likes it."

Elizabeth held out her hands. "I guess we had similar ideas," the brunette coughed, looking down to the present in her hands. "All of her favorite candies. My pastry chef taught me how to put them all together like this. It's sort of like a trifle but with candy instead of deserts."

"I'm sure she'd love that." Sitting herself down across from the other grandmother, Angela tried to block out the other voices around her. "So, did Emily tell you what the doctors said about Sammy? They found a brain tumor."

"Yes she did."

Angela sighed. "Those can be genetic, you know. I wonder if anyone from her biological family had anything similar."

The older woman smiled over to the woman she had once been close to. "I already have a few of my employees looking into it."

Looking up at the sound of the door opening, Angela watched her daughter storm out of the hospital room and slam the door shut. "Jane?"

"Leave me alone, ma'."

"Jane," Angela yelled as she stood up from her seat. "Where are you going?"

Spinning on her heel, the woman with tears in her eyes pointed stabbingly toward the door she had slammed closed. "Why don't you ask the woman I married?"

Sharing a worried look with the diplomat as Jane stormed off, Angela hurried into the room, tugging the bear she had gotten her granddaughter hard through the doorway when she felt it get stuck. "Emily?"

Elizabeth followed the Italian woman into their granddaughter's room and found her daughter crying in the chair she hadn't wanted to leave the night before. "Oh darling," she cooed, bending down and taking the agent into her arms just as she had many times when she was younger. "What's the matter?"

"This isn't fair," she cried through gritted teeth. "It isn't my fault."

"What's not your fault?" Angela asked softly, her hand rubbing down the younger mother's shaking arm.

Emily took her arms from around her mother so she could wipe the angry tears from her face. "Your daughter," the agent hissed. "Bringing up everything that tore us apart is her specialty, isn't it?"

The Ambassador didn't even need to ask what it was about. "She brought up Bambi."

"It was not my fault." Emily found her voice growing weaker, her words cracking from syllable to syllable as the hospital door opened again. "Who blames the death of their daughter on their wife?"

"She doesn't mean to, sweetheart. She's just upset."

The brown eyed mother glared at her once mother-in-law. "It has been three years. I hated that I was with her when she died, but I can't change what happened. Then after trying to help Sammy become happy again, Jane accused me of moving on from Bambi too quickly and resented me for it. How is any of that my fault?"

"It's not," a new voice chimed in.

Emily looked up to see her best friend standing in the doorway, and abandoning the two women that had been trying to comfort her, she practically jumped into the Unit Chief's arms.

He kissed her hair, his arms wrapping around her shaking body as he let her sob into his neck. "I know," he tried to quiet her, feeling her stiffen slightly in his arms. "How many times have I come over to cry to you about Haley? You can let it out."

Letting the older man lead her out of the room, Emily broke free of her friend's hold and slammed her hands against the opposite wall.

Hotch kept himself a small distance away from the angered woman, his brown eyes, just a hint lighter than hers, watching as she ran her fingers through her dark tendrils. "What did she say?"

"She brought it all back around to Bambi. When doesn't she do that?" She sucked in a breath, feeling her tears begin to choke her. "Was I the one who was driving the car that hit her? Was I?"

The older man shook his head. "You weren't."

Emily let out a cry, her shoulders slacking. "Then why does she treat me like I was?"

"She hasn't gotten over her yet. You know what it's like to compartmentalize differently than most people, and I know that you're going to have to let her get through what she needs to even though it might hurt you in the process."

"And what if it hurts Sammy?" she asked, her hands throwing themselves up in the air. "I can't do that to her."

Hotch kept his eyes on the younger woman. "Do you love her?"

Emily looked pitifully to her boss, not noticing the two women standing in the hospital room's doorway as they listened. "Of course I do."

"Then you go and find her and talk to her."

"I don't need her throwing shit on me," she growled. "That is not what love is."

Hotch watched as her eyes softened ever so slightly at the thought of her ex, even as the anger running through her was easily noticed. "You talk to her. Then when you're done, you can come and find me and tell me what love is."


	8. Chapter 8

Brining her arm up to dry her tear-stained face with her jacket sleeve, Emily walked slowly out of the hospital to try and find the woman she had promised to spend her life with. They had promised to never let anything tear them apart, and as she hesitated stepping out the entrance door, the FBI agent thought of how when the opportunity came, Jane had practically pushed her all the way out of their life, only wanting their adopted daughter to be what remained between them.

"Jane?" Her voice husked, sending it an octave lower than usual from having cried for so long. "Jane are you out here?"

Blowing out a breath of smoke when she heard her ex-wife growing closer, Jane leaned back against the brick post. "Right here."

Emily crossed her arms over her chest, closing her jacket tighter when the air grew cold. "Thought you quit," she said quietly. "Right before you went back to Boston, I saw you throw out your last pack." The nasty habit that they had both shared was dropped the second they lost their daughter, and to see the younger woman smoking again made Emily's blood go cold.

Jane chanced a look at the older woman. "I did," she nodded slowly, seeing the tear tracks that had stained her ex's face. "But things happen."

"Last time you smoked, Bambi got sick." Emily's voice was harsh, her eyes hardening when she saw the detective take another puff as she stiffened. "She had asthma because of us."

"I get it," she spit out, glaring hard at the woman who made her blood boil. "I fucking get it."

Emily's arm shot out and she took the cigarette from the younger woman, throwing it to the ground before stabbing at it with her foot.

Crossing her arms over her chest much like the other brunette had, Jane shook her head. "You can blame yourself for that."

"Of course I can," Emily grinned, her heart tearing at the look in her ex's eyes. "What else can we throw at me, huh? What else in your life that is such shit can possibly be my fault?"

"You don't get it, do you? You don't get what this is about."

The older woman's eyes widened at that severity in Jane's voice. "What what is about? The fact that you blame everything on me? The fact that it's been three fucking years and because of you, I have to feel guilt for Bambi dying? That is not my fault! Nothing you've blamed on me is my fault!"

Jane wiped a hand down her face. "I'm upset, ok?"

"So that means you get to throw everything on me?"

"Oh my God! Emily, we're not talking about you!" Jane yelled, attracting the attention of those outside the hospital. "We're talking about me!"

"Are you fucking kidding me?" Emily stepped closer to the tall woman with her stiff body raging. "We're talking about us, Jane. We're talking about us, Sammy and Bambi."

Jane ran her hands through her hair. "Wow, you give me anxiety."

The FBI agent felt her hands begin to shake, wanting to go up and slam the younger woman's body against the post. "I give you anxiety? You're the one who screamed at me back up there and left while I was having an attack!"

"Excuse me," a shy voice interrupted, waiting until the two upset women in the front of the hospital turned to look her way. "I'm sorry but you both are disturbing the patients. I have to ask you to leave."

Emily did her best to smile to the nurse before looking back to her ex. "Come with me."

Jane rolled her eyes. "Please."

"Come with me and get the fuck in my car," she growled, forcing the younger woman forward with a glare from her brown eyes. Getting in the car, she pulled her door shut and locked it, putting the keys into the ignition so she could turn on the air conditioning. "Fine. You want to blame everything on me, and I want to know why."

Flicking her tongue over her two front teeth, the Italian detective gave a humorless smile. "You want to know why?"

Emily stared at the younger woman with dull eyes. "I just want to know why you hate me so much," she whispered, feeling a pain in her heart when Jane's head whipped around to look at her. "Please."


	9. Chapter 9

She hated seeing the older woman cry, especially when she knew it was her fault, and Jane's hands squeezed hard at her thighs. "Stop crying."

Emily shook her head, bringing her hands up to wipe away the tears.

"Just stop crying," Jane said forcefully, her own tears falling from her eyes at the look of hurt on her ex-wife's face. "Stop!"

Emily gasped, her eyes widening when the younger woman grabbed her hands and pulled them toward her to stop her from wiping at her cheeks. Looking into those dark eyes that had scared her when they were screaming at one another outside the hospital, Emily let out a breath. "Please," she whispered. "I just want to know why. What have I done wrong?"

The detective's grip loosened just slightly on the other mother's wrists, knowing that if she kept that tight a hold on her that she would lose circulation. "You didn't do anything," the brunette sighed. "I get it, I get that you didn't kill her."

"You've always yelled at me, blamed me. Do you know what it was like to have guilt for Bambi dying and then have you make everything one hundred percent worse?"

Jane held her ex's wrists tighter at the words coming from her mouth.

Emily moved a little closer to the console that separated them, looking at the younger woman with her reddened eyes. "Did you know that after we fought and you went to sleep with Sammy in her room, I slept in Bambi's?"

"You did?"

"Every night, after I watched you walk into the room down the hall, I thought I'd go into Bambi's room and it would make me feel better; make me feel closer to her, you know?" Her doe eyes were begging for the younger woman to understand the pain she had gone through. "But I'd sit by the starter bed she had only slept in for a week before I started crying. I had just lost her, and then I felt like I was losing you."

Jane's lips curled in as she watched Emily glance down to their hands. "I'm right here," she tried to say, her voice failing to work as her heart tore in two. How could she have done something like that to her wife? "And I'm so sorry."

"You hated me, didn't you?"

"No," she cried, her curls shaking just as her head did. "What was I supposed to do? Who was I supposed to blame? You were with her when she got hit by the car and I thought you could have done something to stop it. But I get it, ok? I get that you couldn't save her."

Emily sucked in a breath, feeling the cool air coming from the vents hit her sweating skin. "Then did you say it was my fault? Even today you said it was my fault!"

"Well what am I supposed to do?"

"We deal with it together," she insisted, pulling the Italian woman closer by their now connected hands. "It's not my fault and it's not your fault. It's no one's fault but the driver's and I never understood why I didn't blame him to begin with. I blamed myself, and I shouldn't have." Her eyes softened the most they could on the younger woman. "We have to understand that."

Jane felt her chest heave as she began to cry. "I'm so sorry," she sobbed, grabbing Emily by the sides of her head and setting their foreheads together roughly. "I'm so sorry I did that to you."

Emily stayed calm, feeling her heart warming in her chest when she finally heard the vulnerability in her ex's voice. "We have to stick together, ok? We're going to be just fine if we stick together."

"What if Sammy dies? What if we lose another baby?"

"Stop," she stressed, tangling her fingers in Jane's dark hair to keep her calm. "Sammy is going to be just fine, alright? Look at me."

Jane hesitated before glancing up into the older woman's eyes, her breathing mingling with the beautiful woman's as they stared at each other with such love.

She felt her breath leave her at the look she was getting from the beautiful brunette before her, and before she knew it the agent was crashing her lips into the other mother's.


	10. Chapter 10

"Where's momma?" Sammy rubbed her eyes with her closed fists as she felt both grandmothers settle on the sides of her hospital bed. "Did she and mommy go somewhere?"

Elizabeth reached down and brushed the eight year old's blond hair from her eyes. "They had to go somewhere and talk for a little while, honey."

The blonde's brown eyes widened in delight. "About my birthday?"

"I don't know, pumpkin," Angela laughed, tickling lightly at her granddaughter's stomach. "Maybe. How are you feeling? Any better?"

"If my head doesn't hurt, can I go home?"

The Ambassador's heart ached for the young girl who sat up as gently as she could in her hospital bed. "I don't think so, Sammy. The doctors want you to stay here for another week before they take the excess tissue from your head, remember? And then you're going to need to stay even a little longer after that happens."

"But why?" the eight year old pouted. "Mommy said we were going to visit momma!"

Angela shrugged. "Well your momma is here now, right?"

Sammy frowned at the adult logic. "Yeah."

"So isn't it nice that momma came all the way down here to see you? Doesn't that sound just as good as you going to visit her?"

The blond child's fingers gripped at the sanitized sheet that she slept on. "No it's not the same!"

Elizabeth grinned at her grandchild. "You are still getting to see your mother, aren't you?"

"You are not getting it," the little girl said through grit teeth, looking as intimidating as she could, glaring at the two older women just as her two mothers had taught her.

"Ok honey, tell us what you mean."

Sammy pursed her thin lips and moved them from side to side as she thought of the right words to say. "Mommy and me were gonna go up to visit momma as a surprise, but I know it wasn't really a surprise because she had to ask first to make sure momma wasn't busy, and we were gonna stay up there for a long time. But now we can't do that 'cause we're all here instead of there."

Elizabeth shared a pout with the hurting girl. "So the big vacation was ruined, wasn't it?"

"Yeah," she whined.

"Well maybe we can do something for your momma, something just as big, maybe even bigger, than that trip you were planning," Angela nodded happily. "Nana and I can help you."

Looking up from the book JJ had gotten him from her house when she went to let Henry rest, Hotch saw his best friend coming out of the elevator with Jane right behind her. "You two were gone for a while."

Emily tried her best to discreetly wipe the back of her hand against her lips before nodding to the taller woman so she knew she could walk back into their daughter's room. "Yeah," the mother sighed gently, hearing the click of the hospital door as she made her way to her friend and sat down beside him. "We got a little loud when we were talking, and some nurse made us leave the front of the building. We got into my car and we finally hashed things out," Emily nodded.

Hotch saw the slight sparkle in the brunette's eyes.

"We decided to work on things while everything is going on with Sammy. We're going to be here for one another and we're going to try to find what we lost." Emily smiled at the look on her friend's face and she quickly nodded her head. "Yes, we kissed. And," she sighed happily, reaching forward and kissing Hotch's cheek, "I definitely think I know what love is."


	11. Chapter 11

_Emily held her crying daughter to her front, her arms wrapped protectively around her little chest as tears slid down her ivory features. "Go give your momma a hug," she husked, letting the blond girl run toward her other mother once she set her final suitcase down by the door. "_

_Momma," the five year old cried, flinging herself into the Italian woman's arms and sobbing into her shirt. "Momma don't go!"_

_Jane wrapped her arms as tight around her daughter as she could, her lips pressing a lingering kiss to the five year old's forehead. "I'm gonna call you when I get there, ok sweetie?"_

_"_ _Momma don't go!"_

_The brunette woman glanced up to see Emily wiping her sleeve underneath her eyes to stop her crying, knowing she was only doing that because Sammy was with them. "I have to go."_

_Sammy pulled back from her mother's grip and shoved her away, watching as she stumbled backwards. "I hate you!"_

_Emily let out a shaky sigh as she watched her daughter run out of the house and toward the taxi that was waiting outside their home. "Jane?"_

_"_ _Don't," she said harshly. "I need to go. I need to get away from you."_

_Emily gave a cry at the words, her eyes blurring as the younger woman stood with her last suitcase in hand. "But I love you," she breathed, those haunted words hiccupped through her lips as she tried to find her breath._

_Jane glared hard at the agent who stood with her arms folded tight across her chest. "Yeah, well I don't love you. Not anymore."_

_She left her now ex-wife standing in the doorway of their home, Jane sitting in the back of the taxi cab trying to block out the sounds of her daughter crying._

_"Sammy," the elder parent tried to chaste, stepping out onto the porch. "Sammy come back inside."_

_The five year old finally stopped chasing the taxi when it turned off of their road, the young girl falling onto her knees from crying so hard. "Momma!"_

_Emily sucked in a breath and ran out to her little girl, falling to her knees beside the blond and coaxing her into her arms. "Shh baby," she whispered, crying into her beautiful light hair. "It's ok."_

_"_ _She hates me, mommy," Sammy sobbed, clutching onto her adoptive mother. "I hate her!"_

_Holding her sobbing daughter tight in her arms and shakily smoothing down her hair, Emily had to wonder if the woman who had left them there truly did lose her love for them._

Emily bolted upright in her bed, tears running from her eyes, down her neck and into her sleep shirt as she tried to catch her breath. Sorrow immediately filled her rigid body at the recollection her dream had given her, and the agent's hands came up to try and cover her gaping mouth so she could cry.

Throwing the covers off of her, the brunette woman jumped out of her bed and practically sprinted out to the kitchen. Having this type of night for months on end right after they had broken up had Emily knowing exactly what she needed to calm her down.

A small sip of the wine she and Jane had saved from their wedding night.

She wiped her tears and rounded into the kitchen, her breath hitching at the sight of her ex sitting at the counter with the same drink she had wanted in her hand.

"Em?" Jane got up off of the barstool and tiptoed over to the older woman, not wanting to disturb her as she noticed the reddening of her brown eyes. "What's the matter?"

Emily threw her arms around the older woman's neck and cried, her broken heart feeling a spark of warmth hit it when Jane didn't hesitate to hug her back. "Hold me," she sobbed, her fragile body trembling in her ex-wife's hold. "Please just hold me." Kissing quickly at the side of Jane's dark head of hair, Emily whispered, "I love you."

The detective cursed herself for having her own tears come to her eyes, but her hold never faltered. "I love you too."


	12. Chapter 12

"She told me to tell her momma that she was going to make the doctors sign a piece of paper saying that she was coming back to us," Emily tried to smile, her watery eyes looking down to she and Jane's clasped hands. "Sammy is still a little mad that this is getting in the way of our trip to Boston, but we've already made a plan for it when she's healing."

When she's healing, Jane nodded, absently staring out to the wall across from them. "And what's the plan?"

The older woman shook her head. "No, I can't tell you. Our daughter threatened to withhold all my hugs until Christmas time if I let it slip."

It had been a week since Sammy had been admitted in the hospital, and not five hours prior, she had gone into surgery. The two women had been getting closer throughout the week, everyday growing one less inch apart. Jane had let out everything she had put on the older woman and got her resentments off of her chest while Emily took into consideration what the Italian was feeling to make her leave.

"Well I can get that," the Boston detective nodded, looking seriously to the teary eyed brunette at her side. "Going without hugs for months on end would kill me."

Emily gave a watery laugh, bonking her head lightly against Jane's as she watched her smile. "You think maybe I can get one now?" she asked huskily, wanting so badly for the other woman to comfort her like she would for her.

The brunette took her hands from Emily and threw her arms out, waiting until the older woman nuzzled into her hold before her arms closed around her. "She'll be fine."

"I know she'll be fine. She's too headstrong to leave this way."

The determination in the FBI agent's words made Jane shake her head, her lips pressing against Emily's dark head of hair. She couldn't keep up the positivity act if she wanted, knowing the extreme complications that could happen with the type of surgery their daughter was going through right at that moment. "How long has it been since you've prayed?"

Emily's head lifted from her ex-wife's shoulder and she frowned. "A while," she said unsurely. "Maybe at Sammy's birthday, she likes me to do that. Why?"

"You remember right before we got divorced, my dad passed away?" Waiting until Emily nodded, the taller woman in the room cleared her throat. "We would pray together every night, and even when we started fighting, we'd sit on opposite sides of our bedroom and say the prayer out loud."

The ambassador's daughter's breath hitched as the memory hit her like a truck. "I remember," she whispered.

Jane caught the older woman's eyes and let her tears break from their barrier, watching as her heaving breath blew Emily's curls from her face. "Do you think we can pray for Sammy?"

Emily found herself smiling along with the Italian woman in a time of such sorrow, her chest constricting as she tried to pull in a deep breath. "Yeah," she grinned. "I'd like that. I think she'd love that."

Their forehead set together, hands clasped together in Jane's warm lap as their breath mingled between them.

"God," the younger brunette whispered, "Emily and I want to take this time to come to you and speak about our daughter. We haven't in a while, and we apologize for that, but we really need you right now." She felt Emily's hands squeeze hers momentarily before her calloused thumbs ran across the backs of her hands, and immediately her eyes watered even more than before. "Sammy is in surgery for a brain tumor removal, and once she's ok, she needs to be ok, the doctors will be able to tell us if it's benign or cancerous. We need you to please watch over her, God. She's our little girl, and we need her to make it through this."

"Bambi baby," Emily piped up, missing the eyes of the other mother popping open and glancing to her. "It's your mommies here, honey. We miss you so much and we want to let you know that we love you, but right now we need you to watch over your big sister for us. I know you've been watching over all of us for all those years you've been up there, baby, but you really need to hold Sammy's hand through this, ok? I know she'd love to know you're there for her." Looking up and staring strongly into her ex's eyes, Emily tightened her grip of Jane's hands. "We'd love to know that. So you go and be with her, ok? We love you so much Bambi, and you be strong for Sammy."

Jane's lips thinned out as she clenched her jaw, nodding vigorously as she agreed with the preached words from her ex.

"She's gonna do us good, baby," Emily grinned reassuringly, nudging Jane's nose with hers to get her to pay attention to her words. "Sammy's gonna be ok, I know it. You believe in Bambi, don't you?"

"Yeah, yeah I do."

Brown eyes snapping shut, Emily let the detective's lips press needily against hers, small kisses she shared with Jane growing heavier by the second. "Wait," she whimpered, her hands coming up to push the brunette's head away from hers so their lips could defuse. "Stop, stop."

"What?" Jane pulled away just enough to look back into those dark eyes the older woman had. "What is it?"

"I doubt God or Bambi would appreciate what we're doing without ending our prayer first," she giggled, reaching back down to run her fingers over Jane's.

"Right," the detective nodded hurriedly. "Amen."

Emily moaned into the Italian woman's kiss, cupping her cheeks and letting her lay her body down on the couch. She and Jane hadn't kissed since that day they spoke in her car, but having the anxiety riddling them both this evening, it was the perfect way to relieve their stress.

After kissing for over ten minutes, tongues tangling and hands doing their best to stay in the safest of places, Jane straddled her ex-wife's thighs and tugged her lips from the brunette's. "I love you," she said teary-eyed, her husky voice growing deeper with the look of admiration in Emily's midnight orbs. "I'm so sorry about everything. I do love you."

"I know," she breathed, pulling her back down and kissing at her cheek. "I love you too."

Hearing the phone blare from beside them, Emily practically threw the beautiful woman off of her so she could grab at it. "Hello?"

Jane huffed, sitting up on her elbows. "Well that was fun."

"What are you saying?"

The Italian detective watched as Emily's face contorted, her hand coming up to cover her mouth. "What is it?"

"We'll be right there," she said shakily, shoving the phone back into its holder and yanking the younger brunette up with her. "We have to get to the hospital."

"What? What is it?"

The FBI agent spun around and looked up into her ex's eyes with the watery ones of her own. "Some tool slipped from the doctor's hand during surgery and poked at the space they had just removed the tumor from. Her brain is swollen and they don't know how to get it down without her blood pressure dropping too much." Grabbing her hand, Emily raced them toward the front door. "We have to get to the hospital."


	13. Chapter 13

Her foot tapping anxiously against the ground, the echo hitting her ears so hard that it made her temples begin to pound and rattle her brain, Emily held as tight as she could onto the Italian woman's hand who sat at her side.

"They haven't told us anything."

After begging and screaming and crying at the nurses and one of their daughter's doctors to let them in to see her for two hours straight, the couple had sat themselves down in the hall just outside where they were told Sammy was being held, the ICU, with their parents by their side.

"I just want to see her," the agent sighed, her head dropping just as her heart did. "Why is it taking so long?"

The Ambassador ran her hand down her daughter's back, her free hand reaching up to move a dark curl away from the mother's face. "Brain swelling doesn't just go away in a few hours, darling. It could be a while."

Emily shook her head, her free hand resting against her lips before she took them away to breathe. "I just want to see my daughter and know she's ok."

"She's going to be ok," the elder Italian comforted, running her fingers through her daughter's curly hair that fell forward as she rested her head on her shoulder. "I know it. She's our little Sammy."

Jane let out a sigh. "That's what we said about Bambi before she coded during surgery," she husked, tears choking her speech into tiny gasps.

Emily pulled away from her mother and took her ex into her arms, her lips staying rested against her warm, tanned cheek as Jane cried into her hair. "Calm down," she whispered, her arms tight around the taller woman's shoulders as if she were trying her best to ease her shaking. "What if Sammy were with us, huh? She wouldn't want to see us crying. We've cried enough the past week to fill the Hoover Dam," the mother tried to joke, tilting Jane's head back so she could kiss her lips.

The Ambassador smiled at the peck, her eyes meeting Angela's with a smile.

"They won't stop," the detective continued to cry, gesturing to her tears.

Emily kept her cool, wiping the tears away with her thumbs before nodding her head. "Honestly, I think I'm all out of tears at the moment. My eyes are sore from crying, I'm tired and yet I can't fall asleep because I'm too worried about her baby, and I can't kiss you the way I want to to calm you down because our mothers are right here, so neither of us are doing very well right now. But we're going to be ok, and so is Sammy."

"How do you know that?"

The brunette woman rested her forehead against the detective's and, contrary to her thought, new tears quickly spilled down her cheeks. "Because we love each other, and we love our daughter. And you know what? Sammy loves both of us more than we'll ever know, and she's not ready to leave us yet."

Jane let out a breath that fanned the hair from Emily's face, and she cupped her cheeks to bring them as close as possible. "Ok," she hiccupped. "Thank you."

"Thank you," Emily whispered, smiling to the younger brunette before kissing her once more.

The small family of four kept themselves crying quietly in the small portion of the hospital's hallway for almost one more whole hour before a familiar voice perked their ears.

"Family of Samantha Prentiss-Rizzoli?"


	14. Chapter 14

Emily and Jane held their daughter to them as tight as they could, the now nine year old girl cuddled in their arms as they watched the parade go by. They had gotten prime spots in the front of the crowd so Sammy didn't need to be on either of their shoulders.

Her blond hair had a gentle bald spot underneath the curls, and although the spot was red with its still healing stitches, the little girl kept a smile on her face.

The adults that called themselves her parents had gotten back together, their daughter's ordeal bringing them back together and letting them find the love they thought they had lost all those years ago.

They had both given up their jobs.

Emily never thought that was something she was able to do; after finally getting her dream job and being there for just under a decade, and she was quitting?

And Jane had been the youngest woman to have gotten on the Boston police force. She had a life in Massachusetts, friends and her entire family, but she was giving that up to be with her wife and daughter.

They were moving to New York.

New York City, the largest and loudest city in the country, had been the first vacation they had taken when both of their daughters were born, and both Sammy and Bambi had fallen in love. And now that they had their little girl back in their arms and knew she was safe, they wanted to make the best of it.

"Mommy look!"

Emily knelt beside her daughter and grinned, looking out to the passing bands that Sammy was pointing to. "Which is your favorite instrument?"

The blond took a moment to think. "The drums."

"What a coincidence," the former detective grinned as she knelt beside the other two. "They're mine too."

"No way, momma," she gasped, her eyes never leaving the dressed up members of the band that continued to play. "I wanna do it!"

Emily eyed the bright red, the dried blood from her daughter's head, peeking out from underneath the blond of her hair, and she pressed a small kiss beside it. "You know what? I think once we're all moved into our new home in New York, we can set aside a space just for a drumset."

The nine year old twirled around, not noticing her momma winking at her other mother from behind her, and grinned. "Really mommy?"

"Really really," Emily grinned, letting her jump into her open arms and hug the girl tight to her chest. "How are you feeling, baby? The noise isn't hurting your head?"

"No mommy. Are we going to say bye to Aunt JJ before we leave?"

The brunette mother nodded. "Aunt JJ and everybody else. We're having dinner at Uncle Aaron's, remember?"

Samantha's eyes widened, her head nodding as the now former FBI profiler lifted her off the ground and into her arms. "Pizza?"

"What else would we be having?" Jane gasped, her arm wrapping around her once again wife's waist, having run down to the court house to get their lives straightened out even faster, and her fingers tugging at one of her belt loops. "Vegetables?"

At her daughter's laugh, Emily glared at the younger woman. "You're such a bad influence," she laughed lightly. "So naughty."

Seeing the glint of seduction in the ivory woman's eyes, the Italian woman grinned. "And that's why you love me," she whispered, her hand clasping onto Sammy's before locking her lips with Emily's. They were a new family, a reconciled family, and Jane would take out anyone or make right any wrong that tried to get between them again.


End file.
